The Paper learned that on the afternoon of September 17, local time, the "Pu'er Jingmai Mountain Ancient Tea Forest Cultural Landscape" in Yunnan, China, was successfully declared a world cultural heritage in Saudi Arabia, which is the world's first tea culture world heritage and China's 57th world heritage.
"The success of this application is not only a re-recognition, inheritance and re-innovation of the diversified value of the heritage site, but also an urgent need to expand and strengthen the tea industry, which will be a milestone leap for Jingmaishan, China and even the global tea industry," Wang Jianrong, a tea expert and former director of the China Tea Museum, said in an interview with The Paper. Real and strong evidence for artificial domestication and spread and for clarifying the relationship between the origin of tea species and early domestication cultivation. The successful application will also promote cross-border research in various disciplines and promote the establishment of an eco-efficient tea industry. ”
Jingmai Mountain Ancient Tea Forest is located in Pu'er City, Yunnan Province. During the fifth dynasty, the ancestors of the Brown people migrated to Jingmai Mountain, discovered and domesticated and cultivated tea trees, and according to local conditions, jointly cultivated and bred ancient tea forests with later Dai ancestors. Since then, residents of Hani, Wa, Lahu and other ethnic minorities have gradually gathered here, becoming a national grand viewing garden with their own distinct national characteristics and harmonious coexistence. Subsequent generations of Brown and other ethnic minorities continued to cultivate, domesticate, and select tea plants. The original hunting group gradually developed into tea cultivation as the main production activity, and gradually derived economic functions. By the Qing Dynasty, Pu'er tea was identified as a tribute tea for the royal family and court ministers, and the ancient tea forest of Jingmai Mountain entered a period of prosperity. It has maintained stable development so far.
Compared with other famous terraced and farm-style terrace tea gardens in the world, the ancient tea forest of Jingmai Mountain not only has a longer history, but also has distinctive characteristics in its traditional understory planting methods and maintenance methods that use the stability of the forest ecosystem.
Pu'er, Yunnan, Jingmai Mountain
Inscription for World Heritage is a difficult and lengthy process. In 2012, "Yunnan Pu'er Ancient Tea Garden and Tea Culture System" was included in the "Globally Important Agricultural Cultural Heritage" protection pilot of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. In the same year, the State Administration of Cultural Heritage listed the Jingmai Mountain Ancient Tea Garden on the Tentative List of World Cultural Heritage of China.
In 2012, Wang Jianrong, a tea expert and former director of the China Tea Museum, participated in the investigation and field investigation of an expert group sent by the State Administration of Cultural Heritage to Jingmai. Wang Jianrong recalled to the surging news reporter: "After the application of the ancient tea forest in Jingmai Mountain was launched, the relevant national departments and expert teams have done a lot of work in terms of value recognition, heritage protection, industrial structure optimization, and improving the living environment of residents. In 2019, led by the State Administration of Cultural Heritage and gathered experts from China, an international symposium on 'Tea Culture Landscape Protection Research and Sustainable Development' was held in Jingmai to make the final sprint for the application work. ”
International Symposium on Conservation Research and Sustainable Development of Tea Cultural Landscapes held in Pu'er in 2019, photo courtesy of Wang Jianrong
"The application can greatly enhance the popularity, reputation and influence of the Jingmai camellia brand, and then help to rely on the regional ecological environment, cultural landscape resources and around the core theme of Pu'er tea to explore diversified derivative industries such as multi-functional agriculture, cultural tourism industry, popular science research industry, cultural and creative industry, maximize the stimulation of industrial hematopoietic function while avoiding the economic risks caused by excessive dependence on the sale of a single tea, and form a new scene of rural revitalization with orderly industrial development, beautiful and livable ecology, and common prosperity." After the successful application of "Pu'er Jingmai Mountain Ancient Tea Forest Cultural Landscape", Wang Jianrong accepted an exclusive interview with the surging news reporter and had a dialogue on the value of the ancient tea forest of Jingmai Mountain, the origin of tea plants, and the tasting of Pu'er tea.
Dialogue with Wang Jianrong
The Paper: The Jingmai Mountain Ancient Tea Forest Cultural Landscape can be successfully applied for the World Heritage Site, what is its value advantage compared with other tea mountains in China?
Wang Jianrong: The core value of Jingmai Mountain Ancient Tea Forest is first in its thousand-year-old ancient tea forest. Huimin Town, Lancang Lahu Autonomous County, Pu'er City, has 1,180 hectares of ancient tea forest preserved in the heritage area and buffer zone, which is known as "the origin of the natural tea planting method" and "the natural museum of human tea culture, history". It is a typical sample of the tradition of "tea cultivation under the forest" in southwest China and the largest continuous area, the most complete preservation and the oldest artificial cultivation ancient tea garden found in the world.
Jingmai Mountain Ancient Tea Forest is also a natural gene bank of ancient tea plants and a treasure trove of tea culture resources, which provides real and strong evidence to study the origin, evolution, artificial domestication and spread of tea plants, and clarify the relationship between the origin of tea plants and early domestication cultivation.
The entrance to the ancient tea forest of Jingmai Mountain
The Paper: The ancient tea forest cultural landscape of Jingmai Mountain is also a traditional village inhabited by multiple ethnic groups, what kind of ecological relationship is there between local residents and tea?
Wang Jianrong: I can sum it up as "tea in the forest, villages in the tea forest, cultivated land and other production activities outside the tea forest".
The value of the ancient tea forest cultural landscape of Jingmai Mountain is also that it is a three-dimensional composite mountain efficient agriculture and characteristic living landscape example, here is a traditional village inhabited by Dai, Brown, Hani, Wa, Han and other ethnic groups, mountain peoples in full understanding of nature, the use of nature on the basis of wisdom condensed unique land use technology, village construction skills and traditional handmade tea skills, is a model of wisdom mountain settlement.
The vivid picture of "mutual survival of forest tea and common prosperity of people and land", which is a primeval forest agricultural culture and modern ecological civilization, will also bring certain inspiration to the sustainable development of the current society.
Pu'er area of Yunnan, Jingmai Mountain Nuogan Ancient Village
Ancient trees in Jingmai Mountain
The Paper: What impact will the success of the application have on the entire Chinese tea industry?
Wang Jianrong: First of all, it will promote cross-border academic research. The historical cause, cultural value, ecological significance, actual protection, development and utilization of the ancient tea forest of Jingmai Mountain are of great significance to the history of human agricultural development and the cultural landscape value of the ancient tea forest itself, as well as the ethnology, botany, anthropology and ecology hidden in the surface of the landscape.
The second is to promote the establishment of an eco-efficient tea industry. The organic and sustainable evolution of ancient tea plantations and inheriting Chinese tea culture is not only a practical need to truly realize "green water and green mountains are golden mountains and silver mountains" and implement the strategy of rural revitalization, but also an inherent requirement to build the absolute dominant position of Chinese tea culture in the world tea planting, production and tasting, enhance the competitiveness and popularity of the mainland tea industry, and protect global ecology, culture, biodiversity and human creativity.
Ancient tree tea from Jingmai Mountain
There is also the promotion of China as the world's tea source. At present, coffee, grape and agave growing areas around the world have been inscribed on the World Heritage List, while the cultural landscape heritage project with the theme of tea was previously in a blank state. As a masterpiece created by human beings and nature, tea is not only the best plant drink, but also the medium symbol of Chinese culture. China is the origin of tea and tea culture, tea is to China, just as coffee is to Brazil, red wine is to France, beer is to Germany, indispensable. The successful application of Jingmai will greatly enhance the world influence of China's tea industry.
The Paper: There is no doubt that tea originated in China, but why have there been some disputes over the origin of the country, such as the Indian origin theory?
Wang Jianrong: In 1924, British Major Brusch discovered a wild tea tree 13.1 meters tall in the Satya area of Assam, India; in 1833, Brux's brother found a large wild tea tree in Sipizzaga, so he concluded that the origin of tea was in India. When the news came back to Britain, the British were excited. It must be known that Chinese tea was sold very expensive in Britain at that time, so it triggered a rush of British media reports at that time. After that, there were various theories about the origin of tea, such as the first source theory (there is only one place of origin, and tea has mutated during the spread to various places), the second source theory (China and India are the origin of tea), and even the multi-source theory (the natural conditions are suitable, and the places with wild vegetation are the origin of tea plants).
But this is a big joke, tea originated in China and is indisputable. I can talk to you about some real feelings about the wild tea trees I saw in Yunnan, such as the wild big tea tree in Bada in Yunnan (Menghai Bada Mountain in Yunnan), I have been to it three times, this big tea tree is 32 meters tall when it is the tallest, which is equivalent to 10 floors of ordinary houses, and the trunk is thick and needs to be hugged by many people. Later, due to various reasons such as lightning splitting, the big tea tree fell in 2014, and now the remaining 14-meter trunk is displayed in Menghai Chen Sheng Tea Factory. In addition, there are big tea trees like Lincang fragrant bamboo baskets, big tea trees in Bangwei, and big tea trees in the 10,000-acre tea garden of Jingmai Mountain, all of which are very spectacular and wonderful.
In addition to these tall wild tea trees in Yunnan, we have found many large tea trees in Guangxi, Guangdong, Jiangxi, Sichuan, Zhejiang and Fujian, so only some large tea trees have been found in India, which is definitely not enough to be a statement of plant origin.
Fossilized tea seeds of Qinglong in Guizhou
The Paper: What evidence is there to show that tea originated in China?
Wang Jianrong: First of all, tea seed fossils were found in China, which was discovered in Qinglong County, Guizhou in 1980, about 1.65 million years ago. This is a very important piece of physical evidence.
In addition, at the site of the cross-lake bridge in Xiaoshan, Hangzhou, Zhejiang, a tea seed dating back 8,000 years was found, which is the only evidence of ancient tea species in the world. Some clay kettle cooking utensils were also unearthed in the ruins of the Cross Lake Bridge, and there were also some plant residues in them, which we judged to be basically Chinese herbal medicines, although we could not conclude that it was tea, but it must be related to Chinese herbal medicine.
Fossil specimen of ancient tea tree root, unearthed at the site of Luoshan in Yuyaotian, Zhejiang
The 6,000-year-old tea root has also been found at the Luoshan site in Yuyao, Zhejiang, which is arranged in a regular arrangement around the perimeter of human habitation. It shows that it is cultivated artificially, and 6,000 years ago, people cultivated tea plants regularly. These tea tree roots have been tested and found to be the unique theanine component of tea.
The taxonomic units of the plant kingdom are bounded, phylum, class, order, family, genus, species, tea is a "camellia sinensis tea species", the distribution center of plants is in the mainland Yunguichuan area, now found in the Yunguichuan area of camellia plants a total of 23 genera, more than 380 species. Therefore, from a botanical point of view, the center of origin of tea plants should be in the area where the "Camellia sinensis" is more concentrated, and such an area is the place of origin or the center of origin.
The Paper: How did Chinese tea spread around the world?
Wang Jianrong: At present, there are more than 60 countries in the world that grow tea, most of their tea plants are directly introduced from China, and a small number are indirectly introduced from other countries, but all of them come from China, so we can proudly say that China is the homeland of tea, and China's Yunguichuan is the origin of tea plants.
The migration of tea began as early as the 9th century, that is, around 804 AD, when Japanese envoys brought tea seeds and tea cultivation methods to Japan from the rooftop of Zhejiang. Seeds were introduced to the Korean Peninsula from the 9th century. It spread to farther countries, and it was only in the 18th century that the trial was successful in Indonesia, and the large-scale introduction of seeds was not until the 19th century. At that time, Georgia, Brazil, Sri Lanka, India, the United States, Japan, Turkey, Iran, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Vietnam, and Thailand were introduced on a large scale after the 19th century.
Jingmai Mountain is not only Pu'er tea, a place that you don't want to go to if you go.
May 20, 2016, Pu'er, Yunnan, young people making Pu'er tea
In the 20th century, China also carried forward the spirit of internationalism, helping many African countries, such as Kenya and Ethiopia, to plant tea gardens, build tea factories, and teach tea production and processing skills. China has discovered and used tea for thousands of years, but India actually began to cultivate some tea in the 1780s, introduced Chinese tea varieties, and only cultivated in large quantities in the 19th century. So the Indian origin theory can only be described as a bubble.
The Paper: In recent years, some people have proposed that Pu'er tea is a special tea category, which does not belong to the black tea among China's six major tea categories, what do you think?
Wang Jianrong: Pu'er tea is a unique geographical indication product in Yunnan, which is a tea with unique quality characteristics produced according to specific processing technology using Yunnan large-leaf sun-dried green tea that meets the environmental conditions of Pu'er tea production area as raw material. Since the Tang and Song dynasties, Pu'er tea got its name because it was sold in Pu'er Province. Pu'er tea is divided into raw tea and cooked tea, and the history of raw tea is very long, and the ripe tea process only appeared after 1973. At that time, Yunnan's raw tea could only reach the sales area after long-distance transportation, and during the transportation process, people found that the quality of tea changed, the flavor was unique, and the process of ripening tea was gradually formed.
In 2003, the Bureau of Quality and Technical Supervision of Yunnan Province issued the local standards of Yunnan Province, which elaborated the definition of Pu'er tea, which pointed out that the raw materials of Pu'er tea must be large-leaf tea plant fresh leaves in a certain area of Yunnan Province, to be dried by sunlight, and to undergo post-fermentation processing, clearly pointing out the important role of microorganisms in the formation of product quality. Therefore, from the above expression, we can see that microbial fermentation has become a key point, which is also the main reason why Pu'er tea is classified as black tea.
February 26, 2019, Puer, Yunnan, Jingmai Mountain, ancient tea tree tea
The Paper: It is said that Pu'er tea is older and more fragrant, how do we drink Pu'er tea?
Wang Jianrong: At present, there are three main production areas for Pu'er tea, namely Xishuangbanna production area, Pu'er production area and Lincang production area. Pu'er tea also has a life cycle, the older the more fragrant is limited, it is not really always older and more fragrant, to 50 years as a measurement cycle, 15-25 years is a peak period of taste. Ordinary people can save some in small quantities, but they are not suitable for large storage, and large amounts of storage require certain storage standard requirements. If someone tells you it's a century-old tea, I don't recommend you drink it. First of all, the taste of century-old tea has been lost, and secondly, there is a risk of fraud, and it is easy to go astray by pursuing old tea and vintage too much.
In terms of drinking, the taste of Pu'er tea is not easy to steep, so it must be brewed with piping hot boiling water. Since Pu-erh tea has been fermented for a long time, it can be added to the tea moisturizer program with the aim of awakening the tea properties of the tightly pressed tea and also removing miscellaneous flavors. You can use a teapot with a large belly on the brewing to avoid the problem of too strong tea.
Good Pu'er tea soup is red and bright, and the quality tea soup is not bright, and there is often dust or flocculent; Smell the smell, high-quality tea soup hot smell aroma is rich and pure, cold smell aroma sweet and long; The quality is low in aroma, mixed with sour, rusty water and other miscellaneous odors; In terms of taste, the high-quality taste is rich and smooth, moisturizing the throat and sweet, and the quality is bland and even astringent.